Looking for Answers (Friday Devotional)

 

If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you.

- James 1:5

When I was a kid, there would be times when I or one of my friends would have a question to which none of us knew the answer. Whether the question was about the 1992 National League stolen bases leader or about the meaning of life, we had few options to find the answer. If our parents had a lot of books, especially an encyclopedia set, we could mine those for information. If not, we could bike over to the public library and see what we could learn there. And if, after exhausting all the resources at our disposal, we still couldn’t come up with anything, we could just resign ourselves to this frustrating, truthful conclusion: “I don’t know.”

Now, of course, we never have to settle for ambiguity. My kids instinctively tell me to “look it up” whenever I don’t know an answer off the top of my head. Information is a click away.

But wisdom is just as hard to find as ever. If you’re looking for the best answers to the hardest questions, Google won’t help you. Neither will fortune cookies, horoscopes, or crystal balls. Even the advice of trusted friends will often lead you astray.

For those seeking wisdom, the best place to look is the same place faithful people have been searching for thousands of years: God’s Word. By seeking his truth—rather than the deceptions of the culture—you will find wholeness and meaning.

These days, a quick answer is just a Google search away. But for the best answer, don’t look first to the Internet—look to the Lord.

Timing Is Everything (Friday Devotional)

 

Preach the word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction. 

- 2 Timothy 4:2

I haven’t eaten any ice cream this week. I haven’t had a popsicle either, nor have I been in the mood for a smoothie or an iced coffee.

What I have had is oatmeal at breakfast, chili at dinner, and hot tea at all hours of the day. It’s not a mystery why, of course—in a week where most of the country, including Texas, has been dealing with freezing temperatures, certain kinds of foods sound better than others. You don’t want a frozen treat when it’s icy outside, you want comfort food. Certain foods are reserved for certain times.

What is not limited by the seasons is evangelism. In some of his final instructions at the end of 2 Timothy, Paul commands his friend to be prepared to proclaim the gospel “in season and out of season.” In other words, there are times when it’s easy to talk about Jesus and other times when it’s less comfortable—but whether it feels like the right time or not, we should never be ashamed to bear witness to the grace of God.

Our world needs to hear about Jesus, and we have been given the commission to tell them. Faced with that need and that responsibility, we ought to have a sense of urgency, not fret about proper timing. This isn’t chili and ice cream—the time is now!

Shifting Ground (Friday Devotional)

 

And he will be the stability of your times, abundance of salvation, wisdom, and knowledge; the fear of the Lord is Zion's treasure.

- Isaiah 33:6

This past Monday the new semester started for Garland ISD, which meant a few minutes before 8:00 AM, I was saying good morning to the crossing guard and walking my son to the front door of his school. We do this every day, rain or shine—no drop-off lane for us, Andrew always wants to walk.

But this time as we crossed the street, we noticed something was different than it had been in December. Upon crossing, the sidewalk we were accustomed to using was just…gone, nothing but mud and gravel. Apparently, the road construction that’s been underway since August encroached upon the sidewalk during the holidays. All of a sudden, the ground beneath our feet had shifted—literally.

In our fast-paced, modern world, you never know when you’ll feel that kind of tectonic disruption. One moment you think you’ve got everything figured out, then suddenly your world is rocked. It could be something as serious as a critical diagnosis or as marginal as your favorite restaurant shuttering its doors. Whatever the case may be, the point is this the same: if you depend on the world for constancy, you will inevitably find yourself thrown for a loop.

That’s why time and time again, Scripture encourages God’s people to look to our heavenly Father for stability. Unlike the ever-shifting world, the Lord is the same yesterday, today, and forever. While culture ebbs and flows like the tide, God is a rock. And while the things of this earth will pass away, he is eternal.

If you expect the world to slow down for you, you will be disappointed—like they say, life comes at you fast. But even when the ground beneath your feet gives way, the God who guides your steps is steadfast.

New Year, New Me (Friday Devotional)

 

For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all, training us to renounce impiety and worldly passions and in the present age to live lives that are self-controlled, upright, and godly, while we wait for the blessed hope and the manifestation of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ.

- Titus 2:11-13

Anyone who’s been to the gym this week will be the first to tell you: ‘tis the season for New Year’s resolutions. With the ball having dropped in Times Square and the calendar now flipped to 2024, this is the week when people take stock of their lives and decide what changes they want to make.

The most popular goals are varied—better fitness, finances, and mental health top the list. But the overarching theme for these and all other resolutions is self-improvement. People have an idea of who they want to be, and New Year’s resolutions are intended to help get them there.

The Bible tells believers to, in a similar way, look with expectation to the future that awaits us and allow that future to affect your present. For anyone who is in Christ, glory awaits, eternal life and fellowship with God. The things of this world that drag you down and keep you up at night will be cast aside, and the temptations that cause your eye to wander from the Lord will grow dim in the light of his glory.

So the invitation for today—indeed, the calling and command—is to orient your life toward that future, to live as a citizen of the kingdom of God even as you’re still a resident of this world. Guided and empowered by the Holy Spirit, fix your eyes on Jesus and make his Word the chief determinant of your actions. If you’ve declared that Jesus is Lord, then prove it.

Scripture promises that someday every knee will bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. Today and in this year to come, may you resolve to live that future in the present tense.

My Resolutions for 2024

Every year since 2018, I have started the new year by writing out and sharing a lengthy, ambitious list of things I want to take up, put down, or otherwise change in the new year. Inevitably, I fail at a few of those goals—100% is never a reasonable objective here. But I've never fallen to 0% either, always managing to accomplish at least one of the goals I set out for myself.

Believe it or not, I take these lists pretty seriously—I start jotting down potential resolutions at the beginning of December, and once published on January 1, the list is never far from my mind as the year progresses. The past two years have been exercises in futility, and I'm looking for 2024 to be a rebound year in more ways than one. So without further ado, here are my resolutions for the New Year!

1. Read more classic literature.

Inspired by a few popular BookTubers, lately I've been increasingly interested in tackling the literary canon head-on. The truth is, I'm past the stage of my life where an English teacher is going to make me read the classics—which means if I'm ever going to get around to it, it's on me.

My plan is to devote 20 minutes every morning to a "classic," and anything extra is gravy. With some of the more readable, thrilling stories (The Count of Monte Cristo, Les Misérables, etc.) I'm sure I'll go beyond that demand. But for the more ponderous books, eating the elephant one bite at a time will hopefully keep me focused and prevent me from giving up too quickly.

Tune in to my monthly reading log to track my progress on this one!

2. Catch up on the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

Chances are good that I'm the biggest fan of superheroes you know, as my bookshelves can attest. So it probably comes as a surprise to you that I've felt the same fatigue with Marvel Studios' offerings post-Endgame as the general public. There's just so much content out there, and trying to keep up felt more like homework than entertainment after a while.

As a result, I'm woefully behind, having totally ignored multiple Marvel TV shows on Disney+ and even a few of the recent movies. It's time to fish or cut bait before I get so far behind that the backlog is truly insurmountable.

So, starting with Avengers: Endgame, I'm resolving to watch (or, in a few cases, re-watch) every MCU project since 2019 until I'm caught up to the present day. It's not a small task—we're talking dozens of hours of content here—but over the course of an entire year it's manageable, especially since Marvel's output is slowing down considerably in 2024.

Some folks are done with Marvel post-Endgame, and I get it. But when I think about 15-year-old me, trying in vain to convince myself that 2005's Fantastic Four was actually a pretty good movie, I realize how good we've got it right now. I'm not ready to get off the ride quite yet. 

3. Stop treating my phone like a toy.

This has been a perennial resolution for me, and I'm recycling it once again for 2024. Like most folks under the age of 40, I tend to respond to every second of boredom, silence, or confusion by pulling out my phone. I don't like the example that sets for my kids, nor do I like what it says about me.

So I'm setting an admittedly broad goal here: treat my phone like a tool instead of a toy. I don't mind using is as a GPS or a music player or a search engine. But I don't want to default to social media or Angry Birds every moment I'm unoccupied.

Books exist. Conversations exist. And, though we're conditioned to fight it with all our overstimulated beings, sitting still exists. I'd like to give those a try in the quiet moments in 2024, rather than defaulting to my phone.

4. Prioritize contacts with church members.

Pastorally speaking, I'm good about dropping everything to head to the hospital when somebody gets sick, but I'm abysmal at checking in on the member who's missed three Sundays in a row. "Out of sight, out of mind" is unfortunately not too far from the truth—which means I'm letting people fall through the cracks, discipleship-wise.

So the church roster is going to be a permanent fixture in my backpack this year, and I intend to use a chunk of each day to check in on folks, especially those I haven't seen lately. I want to become a prolific sender of thank you cards, a gesture that's both easy and always appreciated. And I want to spend fewer lunches eating alone at my desk when I could otherwise be connecting with members of my church family.

5. Set a new personal record for pages read.

According to Goodreads, in 2023 I read 35 books (not counting comics, which I don’t log), good for 12,737 pages read. That was higher than either of the last two years, but still pales in comparison to 2016-2018, when I was reading more than 15,000 pages per year.

So this year I’m looking to beat my PR, the 18,166 pages (51 books) I read in 2017. Look for me to have my nose buried in a book even more than usual this year.

6. Write it down.

This is a professional resolution more than personal one, an attempt to rectify a bad habit I share with the institution I lead: we rely way too much on our bad memories instead of keeping a written record. Precedents are set, but never codified. Policies are understood, but never formalized. Meetings are held, but notes are not taken. Reminders are given verbally, but without a paper trail to prevent or clear up misunderstandings.

In individual instances, these missteps aren't necessarily the end of the world. But down the road, there can be serious consequences. So in 2024, I'm resolving to make sure that, when decisions are made, a written record is kept. Furthermore, I'm going to do my part to start putting into writing some of the things that are currently floating around in the ether.

Until it's written down, it hasn't happened. That's the mantra for 2024.

7. Prioritize study.

As I was edging dangerously close to burnout at the end of 2023, I started taking shortcuts in my preparation for Bible studies and sermons. Instead of spending hours in prayer and study, I started relying too heavily on rhetorical talent, letting delivery do some of the work that should have fallen to preparation. Having once had a strict study schedule, it became much more common for Friday to roll around with me having done little to no preparation yet. I'm honestly not sure whether anybody noticed, but I did, and I'm not ok with it.

So I'm locking back in to the sermon prep schedule which served me well for my first 10 years of pastoral ministry. Preaching and teaching from the Bible is a serious, sacred task, and preparation for doing so cannot and should not be shortchanged. I let exhaustion and stress push me toward some bad habits; now's the time to break them before they get deeply ingrained.

8. Get out of the office.

If I were to try and isolate the primary source of all my stress in 2023, it would boil down to two words: church politics. From staffing to budgets to committee meetings, an inordinate amount of my time and focus went to navigating and attempting to lead on the administrative side of things.

That's not immediately problematic—administration is part of my job—but there's a balance every pastor must strike between managing the nonprofit organization and leading the ministry. And especially in a congregational, committee-led church where (at least theoretically) many of the administrative duties are handled by church members, my balance was way out of whack in 2023.

So my last resolution, which certainly bleeds into others listed above, is to spend less time in 2024 at my desk and more time doing ministry—discipling church members, connecting with community partners, reaching out to neighbors, and, you know, pastoring. That doesn't mean neglecting my administrative duties, but it does mean obsessing over them less and relying on volunteers to do what they've signed up to do.

As a general rule, churches don't flourish because they have the secret sauce to polity, they flourish because they are singularly focused on serving the Lord faithfully. That's not all on me, but it probably does start with me. So in 2024, expect to see my car in the church parking lot less—not because I'm not working, but because I'm doing the work I should be doing. And that work can't happen with me alone in my office.